Date of birth: 9 May 1939
Place of birth: Calvello, province of Potenza
Arrived in Australia: 1957
Occupation: Teacher
My first major shock here was, when [on] a Saturday night a friend and I were assaulted on the corner of glenlyon road and Sydney road in Brunswick, by some australian youths. This was compensated by experiences of extreme kindness and fairness at work. When I began to work in a chocolate factory in De Carle Street, I had the good fortune of meeting an extraordinary foreman, who seemed powerful but was extremely gentle and sincere. Since my job involved some intervals in which I would have to wait for the goods to be ready, I always had a book with me and I would study while waiting. The foreman protected me to the extent that, sometimes there was work to be done and instead of asking me to do it, he would do it himself or ask somebody else.
Here, despite the prejudice, there was a greater sense of fairness than at home.
I did my secondary schooling here by correspondence with Taylor’s. [Then] I began to work in a solicitor’s office in Carlton, as a law clerk. There I could see that the principle was that you defend a client, not truth, not justice, and that’s maybe the major reason why I never became a lawyer. Also, my major interest is literature, and I thought I would travel, and with a degree in Arts you could do more in other countries – with law you were really stuck here, you wouldn’t be able to utilize it anywhere else.
Calvello is a small and isolated village in Lucania. It is a peasant town but maintaining some of the very rich cultural traditions of very old times.
It was mainly an agricultural village, and I remember in the evening when all the peasants would come back from the farms, you’d have this enormous procession of people coming with donkeys – there was hardly any other means of transport – and goats and lambs.
Most of the peasants lived in the village and went to work their small pieces of land every day, some of them would walk for two or three hours before getting to their land.
It was a fairly poor society and, especially after the war, you could see clear signs of poverty although no one was starving.
There was a sense of solidarity in the town so that people in need were helped. There was no welfare state as such, but either through the council or the parish there were ways of helping people. The land is really quite barren and hilly, and it is really very hard to use for agriculture, so people did survive, but most of them not too comfortably, I think.
There were a great number of people who left after the war and actually, when I was a child I could see, almost daily, people leave. I remember when the coach would leave town, there were some very dramatic scenes; the mothers were crying, they felt that they would lose their children forever.
[The people who left] were often middle aged, they left a full life style, already had a family. Very often they would leave by themselves without wives and children, hoping to call them later to the country where they went.
My father was the adventurous type, [and] didn’t really enjoy living in the village. So he had first left the family for sometime to go to Africa when Italy had colonies, then when he came back, he decided to come to Australia. He came first, then three of us, two of my sisters and myself, joined him, and then my mother and the remaining two sisters came; so it was a gradual migration.
I was about eighteen [when we migrated]. I had practically completed my secondary schooling in Italy.
I first had an old fashioned teacher, who had a sense of integrity and a passionate interest in history. He had a great love of poetry which he inculcated into me.
We weren’t rich, but as I was recommended by my teachers, [they felt I had potential], the family struggled to keep me in a Catholic boarding school. It was rare [to be sent to boarding school] because it was very expensive, so my parents were making an immense effort for me. I had the privilege of being educated by the Salesians who were very traditional school teachers, quite strict in some ways but yet extremely understanding, and sensitive. They were thorough in their teaching and they expected very high standards from us. Because some of us came from working class families, they really made sure that we would reach the same level as the ones from the upper class or professional class families.
I was then writing some poetry and some of my poems were published in a literary magazine. I did have an extremely happy childhood, and I was very happy throughout my secondary school education, and that’s why, in a sense, my coming to Australia was for some time very traumatic.
There was, first of all, the immense problem of learning English. Apart from that, being cut of from that type of culture was very traumatic. I was unhappy for a very long time. This had nothing to do with Australia – it had more to do with the fact that I wanted to become a poet, and being cut off from my culture and my language really meant the end of that dream.
The village was a place rich of experiences; and actually returning to Italy after many years, after many people had left and the agriculture had collapsed, (so that now you really have a village of pensioners) it was a big shock. I felt that in a sense, a whole civilization had collapsed. I suppose it was the same feeling that I had when my mother died; my mother belonged to that village culture; she was a heroic person. She never worked in Australia and she really ran the family, she wasn’t too unhappy in Australia, because, after all, all that counted for her was to live with her family. Once she was here, once she had all her children here, she was right.
In all small towns you have a sense of community and you know everybody. My town which was particularly isolated; it had characteristics which were quite uncommon. It was like living in a shelter, something that you would never find again.
My parents wanted me to become a professional. My father saw that migrating was such a dramatic experience, that one should aim at building up a secure financial position, and, in effect, he was extremely disappointed when I decided not to do Law.
I felt it was wrong for migrants to be asked to assimilate. In 1971/72 I was involved in the ethnic rights movement when it all began, thanks to the people from the Fitzroy Ecumenical Centre. I was asked to give a talk, probably one of the very first lectures against assimilation. I also took part in the preparation of the first document on Ethnic rights. I still have a sense that it is right for a society to try to be pluralistic, but at the same time it must try to maintain a sense of unity.
My major interests have been cultural. Yet I’ve always felt that people should be committed to the community.
I had no interest in a political career when I joined the Labor Party but I only joined to try and do something, to be involved in the Brunswick community.
By being involved, I was really giving the right example to my own children – who I hope will be involved in the community no matter at what level. I think that this is really essential.
I think it is important to build municipal culture, so that there is a sense of identity of belonging to a place.
Source: ‘1985. Brunswick City Council. For a better life we came’. Collected and edited by the Brunswick Oral History Project. Copies available for lending and sale at Moreland City Libraries (Brunswick) ph 9389 8600. Images taken after 1955 are available in the print publication. Original images available in exhibition boxes in storage at Brunswick Library.